2015 Mick Germaine Cup

This year’s Mick Germaine Cup competition, (run under the auspices of the Leinster Chess Union (LCU)) took place on 12th December in the Ierne Sports and Social Club in Drumcondra, home of the Elm Mount Chess club. While the event is for teams of junior players under 16 years of age and rated below 900 or unrated, the majority of the players participating in the event were under 12 years of age. Also a number of players were making their competitive debuts for their teams and enjoying their first taste of tournament chess. This is a most welcome sign for the future of Irish chess.

The victorious Rathminors pictured left.

19 teams of 4 from both chess clubs and schools took part in the 6 round competition. The outright winners, by a margin of 4.5 points, were “Rathminors”. Sanjay Menon, was the team’s highest individual scorer with a 6 wins from six games. The other three team members (Cillian Scallan, Ciara Scallan and Utkarsh Gupta also achieved impressive individual scores of 5.5, 5 and 5 respectively). The only other player in the event with a perfect score of 6 from 6 was Sam Kelly of the Malahide Majors team.

The Malahide Maurarders and Maestros finished second and third respectively while a third Malahide team, the Majors were joint 4th with the Monkstown Rooks team.

The entry was broadly similar to 2014 (where 20 teams competed for the Cup).

Mick Germaine, former Tournament Controller of the Leinster Chess Union, was unable to attend the prize giving ceremony due to illness and we wish him a speedy recovery.

The final standings for the competition are set out below.